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come dexterous in the application of it. Another, of more ingenuity, will examine the principle of the rule before he applies it to use, and will scarcely take the trouble to commit to memory a procefs, which he knows he can, at any time, with a little reflection, recover. The confequence will be, that, in the practice of calculation, he will appear more flow and hef itating, than if he followed the received rules of arithmetic without reflection or reafoning.

Something of the fame kind happens every day in converfation. By far the greater part of the opinions we announce in it, are not the immediate refult of reasoning on the spot, but have been previoufly formed in the closet, or perhaps have been adopted implicitly on the authority of others. The promptitude, therefore, with which a man decides in ordinary difcourfe, is not a certain teft of the quicknefs of his apprehenfion ;* as it may perhaps arise from thofe uncommon efforts to furnish the memory with acquired knowledge, by which men of flow parts endeavor to compenfate for their want of invention; while, on the other hand, it is poffible that a consciousness of originality may give rife to a manner apparently embarraffed, by leading the perfon who feels it, to truft too much to extempore exertions.†

* Memoria facit prompti ingenii famam, ut illa quæ dicimus non domo attulisse, sed ibi protinus sumpsisse videamur. QUINCTIL. Inst. Orat. lib. xi. cap. 2.

In the foregoing observations it is not meant to be implied, that originality of genius is incompatible with a ready recollection of acquired knowledge; but only that it has a tendency unfavorable to it, and that more time and practice will commonly be necessary to familiarise the mind of a man of invention to the ideas of others, or even to the conclusions of his own understanding, than are requisite in ordinary cases. Habits of literary conversation, and, still more, habits of extempore discussion in a popular assembly, are peculiarly useful in giving us a ready and practical com

In general, I believe it may be laid down as a rule, that those who carry about with them a great degree of acquired information, which they have always at command, or who have rendered their own difcoveries fo familiar to them, as always to be in a condition to explain them, without recollection, are very feldom poffeffed of much invention, or even of much quickness of apprehenfion. A man of original genius, who is fond of exercifing his reafoning powers anew on every point as it occurs to him, and who cannot fubmit to rehearse the ideas of others, or to repeat by rote the conclufions which he has deduced from previous reflection, often appears, to fuperficial observers, to fall below the level of ordinary understandings; while another, deftitute both of quicknefs and invention, is admired for that promptitude in his decifions, which arifes from the inferiority of his intellectual abilities.

It must indeed be acknowledged in favor of the last description of men, that in ordinary converfa tion they form the most agreeable, and perhaps the most instructive, companions. How inexhauftible foever the invention of an individual may be, the variety of his own peculiar ideas can bear no proportion to the whole mafs of useful and curious information of which the world is already poffeffed. The converfation, accordingly, of men of genius, is fometimes extremely limited; and is interefting to the few alone, who know the value, and who can diftinguish the marks of originality. In confequence too of that partiality which every man feels for his own fpeculations, they are more in danger of being dogmatical and difputatious, than thofe who have no fyftem which they are interefted to defend.

mand of our knowledge. There is much good sense in the following aphorism of Bacon: "Reading makes a full man, writing a "correct man, and speaking a ready man.” See a commentary on this aphorism in one of the Numbers of the Adventurer.

The fame obfervations may be applied to authors. A book which contains the difcoveries of one individual only, may be admired by a few, who are intimately acquainted with the hiftory of the fcience to which it relates, but it has little chance for popularity with the multitude. An author who poffeffes industry fufficient to collect the ideas of others, and judgment fufficient to arrange them skilfully, is the moft likely person to acquire a high degree of literary fame: and although, in the opinion of enlightened judges, invention forms the chief characteristic of genius, yet it commonly happens that the objects of public admiration are men who are much less diftinguished by this quality, than by extenfive learning and cultivated tafte. Perhaps too, for the mul-> titude, the latter clafs of authors is the most useful ; as their writings contain the more folid discoveries which others have brought to light, feparated from thofe errors with which truth is often blended in the firft formation of a fyftem.

CHAPTER SEVENTH.

OF IMAGINATION.

SECTION I.

Analysis of Imagination.

IN attempting to draw the line between Conception and Imagination, I have already obferved, that the province of the former is to prefent us with an exact transcript of what we have formerly felt and

perceived; that of the latter, to make a felection of qualities and of circumftances from a variety of different objects, and by combining and difpofing these, to form a new creation of its own.

According to the definitions adopted, in general, by modern philofophers, the province of imagination would appear to be limited to objects of fight. "It is the fenfe of fight," (fays Mr. Addifon,)" which "furnishes the Imagination with its ideas; fo that "by the pleasures of Imagination, I here mean fuch "as arife from visible objects, either when we have "them actually in view, or when we call up their "ideas into our minds, by paintings, ftatues, def

criptions, or any the like occafions. We cannot, "indeed, have a fingle image in the fancy, that did "not make its firft entrance through the fight." Agreeably to the fame view of the fubject, Dr. Reid obferves, that "Imagination properly fignifies a lively conception of objects of fight; the former pow"er being diftinguifhed from the latter, as a part "from the whole."

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That this limitation of the province of imagination to one particular clafs of our perceptions is altogether arbitrary, feems to me to be evident; for, although the greater part of the materials which Imagination combines be fupplied by this fenfe, it is nev ertheless indifputable, that our other perceptive faculties alfo contribute occafionally their fhare. How many pleafing images have been borrowed from the fragrance of the fields and the melody of the groves; not to mention that fifter art, whofe magical influence over the human frame, it has been, in all ages, the highest boaft of poetry to celebrate! In the following paffage, even the more grofs fenfations of Tafte form the fubject of an ideal repast, on which it is impoffible not to dwell with fome complacency; particularly after a perufal of the preceding lines, in which the Poet defcribes "the wonders of the Torrid Zone."

Bear me, Pomona! to thy citron groves;
To where the lemon and the piercing lime,
With the deep orange, glowing thro' the green,
Their lighter glories blend. Lay me reclin'd
Beneath the spreading tamarind that shakes,
Fann'd by the breeze, its fever-cooling fruit:
Or, stretch'd amid these orchards of the sun,
O let me drain the cocoa's milky bowl,
More bounteous far than all the frantic juice
Which Baccus pours! Nor, on its slender twigs
Low bending, be the full pomegranate scorn'd;
Nor, creeping thro' the woods, the gelid race
Of berries. Oft in humble station dwells
Unboastful worth, above fastidious pomp.
Witness, thou best Anana, thou the pride
Of vegetable life, beyond whate'er
The Poets imag'd in the golden age:
Quick let me strip thee of thy spiny coat,
Spread thy ambrosial stores, and feast with Jove !*

What an affemblage of other conceptions, different from all thofe hitherto mentioned, has the genius of Virgil combined in one diftich!

Hic gelidi fontes, hic mollia prata, Lycori,
Hic nemus hic ipso tecum consumerer ævo.

These observations are fufficient to fhow, how inadequate a notion of the province of Imagination (confidered even in its reference to the fenfible world) is conveyed by the definitions of Mr. Addifon and of Dr. Reid.-But the fenfible world, it must be remembered, is not the only field where Imagination exerts her powers. All the objects of human knowledge fupply materials to her forming hand; diverfifying infinitely the works fhe produces, while the mode of her operation remains effentially uniform. As it is the fame power of Reasoning which enables us to carry on our investigations with refpect to individual objects, and with respect to claffes or genera; fo it was by the fame proceffes of analyfis and

*Thomson's Summer.